A survey of almost 500 companies carried out by employers' group IBEC has found that 60% of them had pay freezes in place during the first half of 2009.
The IBEC Q2 business sentiment survey also found that 27% of businesses had implemented pay cuts for management, while 18% had cut the pay of other salaried staff and 10% had done so for production workers.
Where cuts were introduced, the average cut for management employees was 17%, compared with 12% for both other salaried and production workers.
Director general Danny McCoy said that overall, the average change to pay rates during the first half of the year was a fall of 4% for management staff, 1.6% for other salaried staff, and 1% for production workers.
56% of companies surveyed said that they had plans to reduce or were considering reducing the number of permanent employees, with 46% saying temporary cuts in staff numbers were being considered.
IBEC says the survey shows that private sector workers are demonstrating 'a high degree of flexibility' in an effort to preserve as many jobs as possible.
